董事會特質對盈餘管理之影響:以保險取得成本之攤銷為例

Abstract

本文探討董事會特質、盈餘管理與保險業保單取得成本攤銷（Deferred Acquisition Costs Amortizations) 三者之關係。本文研究發現保單取得成本之攤銷費用可能因其對淨利影響之重大性與受精算假設變動之影響甚鉅，成為保險公司用以進行盈餘平穩化的工具。而當公司的外部董事百分比較低、董事平均年齡較高以及低於七十歲之董事百分比較少時，董事會較能發揮監督功能，公司透過保單取得成本攤銷進行盈餘平穩化的情形將受到抑制而減緩。由於本文部份研究發現與先前多數學術研究發現有所不同（如：外部董事百分比較低，對公司進行盈餘管理行為較具抑制效果），可推得在高度管制與特殊的保險業，董事會特質對盈餘管理之影響與其他一般產業有所不同，考量兩者關聯性時應將保險業之特殊性與複雜性一併納入，不應等同視之。

This paper examines the relations between board characteristics, earnings management incentives and deferred acquisition costs (DAC) amortizations of publicly traded insurance firms. The results indicate that earnings smoothing is highly significantly associated with DAC amortizations, and earnings smoothing through DAC amortizations is somewhat mitigated by boards with smaller percentage of outside directors, larger average age of board directors, and smaller percentage of directors who are under 70. While some of the results are contrary to academic common findings (i.e., firms with smaller percentage of outside director members engage less in earnings smoothing), it can be interpreted that in a specialized and regulated industry such as insurance, governance structures of boards and their effectiveness cannot be generalized from nonfinancial firms.